Japan eyes new law to allow N Korea cargo inspections

Fri Oct 30, 12:30 am ET

TOKYO (AFP) – Japan's government submitted a bill Friday to allow its coastguard and customs officers to inspect North Korean shipments suspected of including nuclear and missile-related materials.

The proposed law would help Japan enforce a United Nations resolution designed to punish the isolated regime for its second nuclear test in May.

Unlike a bill that died with the previous conservative government ousted in August elections, the proposal tabled by the centre-left government of Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama would not involve Japan's navy.

Under the bill, Japanese coastguard and customs inspectors would require the consent of a ship's captain before boarding a vessel and carrying out cargo inspections mandated by UN Security Council Resolution 1874.

Japan's new leaders have backed away from the more hawkish stance of the former government but have maintained a strong line against North Korea.

Transport Minister Seiji Maehara said the cabinet had in a morning session decided to submit the bill on Friday in the lower house of the Diet.

"After this bill is enacted, relevant ministries will need to cooperate to collect information to carry out cargo inspections appropriately," he said.

The government of then premier Taro Aso submitted a bill in July which would have authorised the Maritime Self-Defence Forces to take part in inspections but it was aborted when Aso dissolved the Diet and called elections.

Relations have long been tense between Japan, which once colonised the Korean peninsula, and communist North Korea, whose agents in the 1970s and 80s abducted Japanese citizens to help train Pyongyang's spies.

After North Korea staged its first nuclear test in 2006, Japan imposed formal bilateral sanctions. It has since stopped all trade, frozen air and sea transport links and banned almost all visits by North Korean citizens.

Pyongyang quit six-party denuclearisation talks -- between the two Koreas, the United States, China, Russia and Japan -- after the UN Security Council censured it for a long-range rocket launch over Japan in April.